Jimmy Ryan – HuffPost 10.25.10

Mike Ragogna: Having served your country well all these years in the music business, what advice might you have for new artists that want to get started?

Jimmy Ryan: Boy, it’s tough. I’ve got two very talented kids, and I’m telling them that a law degree would be really good. (laughs) I don’t know. It’s a new business and it hasn’t formed yet. We’re in a morphing state right now, where it’s not clear where it’s going. I would be the last person to say that if music is your passion, forget about it–I would never say that. If you love music, play music, but be prepared to be hungry. Truthfully, that’s always been the case–a few bad artists make it to the top, but for the most part, the people who really make it to the top had all the stars line up. They had the right connections, the talent, or if they don’t have the talent, they have the looks. Some combination takes them up there, but it’s a number of things, not just the talent. You have to have a look, you have to have the charisma, you have to have a business savvy about you–although in the ’50s, that wasn’t necessary. But in the ’50s, nobody made any money. There are a number of things that are very, very important. You have to be good with people, you have to be a good negotiator, and there are so many things involved that it’s kind of like winning the lottery. Do it, by all means, but have something in your back pocket to feed yourself because it can be a long, hard haul, and you have to be realistic about it.

I actually didn’t go to college for music, I went for electrical engineering. Even not knowing what was coming, I still went to college for a different career. While I was in college I had a hit, so that’s what changed the tide for me, but I wasn’t counting on it. I wanted it to be that way, I wanted to have a hit, and from the time I picked up a guitar, which was eight years old, I wanted to be Elvis Presley. I loved music and I loved performing, but around age seventeen or eighteen, all my friends were going to college and nothing was happening. I wasn’t going to play bars for the rest of my life, so I went to college. I went to Villanova, Don Ciccone was my roommate, and, luckily, in my sophomore year, “Younger Girl” came out, and that was kind of the end of it. I made it through about two months of my junior year; coming home at four o’clock in the morning from being on tour on a Sunday night, and then going to an eight o’clock calculus class didn’t work. So, I dropped out and that was the end of college for me. But I did go to college fully intending to graduate and be an electrical engineer had the music thing not worked out. I would say do that–keep your bases covered–and if it works out for you, it works out, but don’t cut off all your resources to do it. I just don’t think that makes any sense.